BBC THREE WAS A VERY BAD IDEA

It's been over a year since BBC THREE returned to TV... but was it A BAD IDEA?

In an age where streaming services continue to grow and dominate the landscape, the move to return BBC Three back to television from online-only seemed odd to many. And as time has passed, we discuss whether this second coming actually held any weight, and what kind of future the channel may have going forward...

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#bbc #three #badidea

[joevictor]

I loved the original BBC Three. I found out about a lot of my favourite films through BBC Three along with some comedy shows and Doctor Who Confidential

[turnonmyaxel]

I do think the problem is the programming. It's no longer putting out the stuff which are making people stop and want to watch.


Also I feel like E4 and ITV2 just have stronger outputs that actually appeal to the age demographic not just trhtowing buzzwords to make the next reality show

[PopUnlimited]

I'm surprised you bought the idea that the reason they put it online in the first place was because of changing viewing habits etc. It was almost entirely due to the fact they made massive cuts to BBC Three's programming budget - and attempting to continue a linear schedule would only have made that all the more obvious. When they did the u-turn on that, they brought back the channel as well because they could now fill a schedule again.

The cost of running the channel itself is minimal compared to the cost of making the programmes. And whilst they're probably disappointed with the live viewing figures, there's probably not much to be saved by ditching it again. It probably will happen at some point anyway, but it's really not that big a deal. Certainly not a VERY BAD IDEA. The big decision they made was to spend more money on programmes for young people, which had to happen.

Though whether they're spending it in the right way is debatable..

[EmmaJones]

I’m a adult with Autism, who at times watches CBBC, how they can think about axing CBBC and keeping a channel nobody watches is madness

[davepoole]

BBC Three was something I wished for with envy in the early days with all the exciting new programming. By the time we got Freeview down here, the honeymoon period was over but they still had brilliant programmes like Being Human, Mongrels and In the Flesh.
Suddenly though it seemed to deliberately become bad and turned into an ITV2 knock-off and I suppose managers thought by the time it went off air people wouldn't particularly miss it by then.
I looked forward to the return of BBC Three but to my disappointment it was back to 'self-destruct TV' and was showing the same ITV2 style crap that they were showing towards the first shut down. In The Flesh was a true tragic loss to television not continuing because of a lack of funding (and possibly a reason for the cut in funds due to the fact it was such a good satire on Conservative society).

[PSGamingScotland]

I use to love watching the documentaries from Stacey Dooley and Reggie Yates and there was that show where groups of guys and girls would go on a holiday and the parents would secretly spy on them. I'm glad it's returned but haven't watched it once as none of the shows really appeal to me and there's a lot more competition nowadays but I hope it lasts for many years to come.

[v.]

I think BBC Three would be improved if they showed archive content from the Late 90s To the Mid/Late 2000s, Since its targeted for Millennials and Gen Z.

It all depends on rights but shows like The Fresh Prince of Bel-air, Robot Wars and Old episodes of Top gear, as well as new content which sparks intrest to the vast majority of the audience.

It would be cool if they could get the rights to (probably wont or cant) various game shows which are currently not on TV often or not at all, such as Takeshi's Castle, The Crystal maze and Fort Boyard.

[SenhorBundy]

Australian TV fan here - as you may know, we got rid of our licence fee back in 1974, as it cost more to enforce (rural Australia says hello) than it was taking in.

[guksack]

The "A very bad idea" statement feels a bit odd without a question mark on the end! The 16-35 demographic still channel surf in high numbers (Love Island/Britain's Got Talent/etc) and I think they would be silly not to try and claw back at some of that lost ground whilst they still can. It'll likely take a few years to make some impact in that department, but once they get another Fleabag etc they'll find their new audience. 18 months is not very long in TV land.

I am sad that "BBC Three" only returned in name compared to the glory days when it was by far my favourite channel, but viewing habits/fashions change and sadly that's the way it is. But I hope it works out for them.

[josephharrington]

What’s a bad idea about BBC3 is when they axed it in the first place. I like watching BBC3 because they have great programmes like Sun, Sex & Suspicious Parents, Pramface, Family Guy & American Dad.

[waynehough]

used to watch it all the time back in the day for shows like Family Guy and Little Britain and several great British sitcoms aimed at a youthful audience they had on there so was excited when it got relaunched but tbh I’ve barely watched it since

[xaviniestahernandez]

I don't see BBC Three being cut from linear TV again, at least not in the near future. One of the main reasons for BBC3's return was the prospect of reaching a wider audience beyond
the youth demographic, who watch the channel's content online. Perhaps in the future the remit of the channel could change to serve this new audience

[samuel-wankenobi]

The problem is most shows the target demographic is interested in are on other channels or on a streaming service

[jamesmt]

The BBC could easily scale back to just BBC One and BBC Two in terms of linear. Nearly everything from BBC Three and BBC Four would find a natural home on BBC Two, and the archive side of BBC Four would definitely find a natural home on the iPlayer.

However, based on that hat, Adam probably used BBC Three about 13 months ago. 😉

If they do want to shut BBC Four and especially CBBC, major questions have to be asked as to why the Scotland channel is still a thing? What is that doing that a returned BBC Two Scotland couldn't? Furthermore, it creates huge headaches for opting out on BBC One Scotland as there's now no BBC Two Scotland where the displaced network programme can be aired instead. It's surely better both economically and operationally?

[picoultimate]

Yeah, it's a shame that BBC Three ended up getting reduced to this after so long on the air.

[dennislewis]

Well, as someone who's 30 years past its intended demographic, in June every night when I got back to the hotel in Cardiff it seemed like BBC 3 had the most interesting program coming on. I especially remember that "The Exorcist" was on one night. For various reasons, I had never watched that movie all the way through in the states, so when I saw it on the BBC 3 listing I thought, "this is the night." Especially since I knew BBC 3 wouldn't have commercial interruptions.

It took me some time to get used to BBC 3's station identifiers - the handless fingers. Odd.

[sophie_drachen]

Apart from Drag Race UK (although I do watch it on iPlayer), nothing on BBC Three has really jumped out at me, well when it returned to linear television. I loved Fleabag, and in the zeitgeist of BBC Three in the mid-2000s/10s, my mum loved the show Being Human, also Gavin and Stacey (she has a DVD boxset of it somewhere) and I used to obsessively watch Snog Marry Avoid.

[EGRAVEN-genj]

I remember the days when BBC Three used to show Wallace and Gromit cartoons. Takes me back

[AdamGrowells.they-them]

The only people I know who watch actual TV version of BBC THREE. Are people who want to have family guy on in background at 2am.
(Idk if that's even still a thing as most people do this via Disney plus?)

[DrWhoFanJ]

I think the reason I’m less fussed about BBC Three than others is that I reached the age when the content it showed (outside of DWC and occasional repeats) was theoretically something I might choose to watch just as it moved somewhere I no longer had a viable way of accessing it. (The television in our house at the time had no Internet connection point, so iPlayer was very much a thing for the computer and nothing else, and I had no available personal technology of my own I could use either.)

This meant that the only time I’ve watched it while being within its target demographic was 2016, with the DW spinoff _Class_ (which had to be delayed by several hours until the necessary subtitles were added; still not sure why it took them so long to do that rather-basic job).

Even now, we tend to (and I always) use recordings of TV shows rather than catchup services (especially for non-BBC programmes, where they still force you to watch ads every few minutes!) because the signal where we live isn’t up to it (it’s recently been fixed now, though, so I might start using BBC iPlayer more!).

TL;DR I’m less bothered about the fate of BBC Three as it switched away from being an actual channel just as I became old enough to be potentially interested in its content.